Sony Pulls Controversial Anti-Piracy Software

An anonymous reader writes "Bowing to public outrage, Sony BMG has temporarily halted the use of its controversial anti-piracy software in all of its music CDs, the company said in a statement today. The move comes just a day after a top Bush administration official chided Sony and the entertainment industry for going too far: according to this story over at Washingtonpost.com, Stewart Baker, the Department of Homeland Security's policy czar warned would-be DRM makers: 'It's very important to remember that it's your intellectual property -- it's not your computer. And in the pursuit of protection of intellectual property, it's important not to defeat or undermine the security measures that people need to adopt in these days.' The Post has the full text and video of his commentary." We've reported on this story previously.

Comments

Who will "trust" them next time?

[Gerk]

I for one am boycotting all Sony music from here on if it comes on CD. Windows root-kit, OSX kernel extensions ... how can you trust them? The RIAA and big record companies are getting very long in the tooth and I would love nothing more than to see them get taken down. They have all but destroyed the industry over the years and turned it into something worse than politics.

The most talented musicians I know are waiters, bus boys and taxi drivers, thanks to the recording industry.

Can't wait for someone to shake it all apart by releasing their works without the industry influences (and the industry taking their piece of the pie).

I wonder . . .

[harley_frog]

Are the people who purchased the DRM/spyware CDs due a replacement copy without the DRM/spyware?

Byeee DRM?

[rilister]

Wonderful to watch this going south in a big way, dragging the whole concept of DRM with it. We all owe Sony a debt of thanks, really.

I particularly enjoyed this quote from First4Internet's website from their director of Sales & Marketing:
"We're not denying people access to the music," Macdonald said. "We're just trying to help them manage their access."

http://www.xcp-aurora.com/press_article.aspx?art=x cp_art10

Please! Please, Mr. MacDonald! Help me manage my access to my media by installing a rootkit!

Re:They'll still be liable though

[coolgeek]

You seem to have missed the point that they have also broken several state and federal statutes related to spyware and trespass.

This has hurt sonys reputation badly.

[Sj0]

I have an e-mail message showing EECOL Electric in Canada telling it's employees, "DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES INSERT SONY MUSIC CD'S INTO YOUR COMPUTER, EITHER AT HOME OR WORK!" in big red letters, followed by an explanation of the situation.

I'm positive this isn't the only company which has sent out similar notices.

Re:They'll still be liable though

[John Hasler]

> Sony made a stupid PR mistake, but they are too big a company to
> really suffer from it so badly...

They will suffer a substantial loss of CD sales. All that the twentysomethings will remember from the newsblips they saw on ABC is that Sony CDs break your computer.

Re:Why can't they go to jail?

[mrchaotica]

Perhaps we should consider the actual damage done. Is the damage so severe and widespread that someone needs to (essentially) pay with their life? I believe that many of the felons convicted for computer crimes probably shouldn't have been felony convictions in the first place. Most of these (in the early days, especially) were just kids

Yes, yes, yes, YES and YES!!!

Yes, they DAMN WELL SHOULD GO TO JAIL FOR THIS!! You know why? Because these aren't teenage script-kiddies trying to prove a point, these are high-ranking executives of multinational corporations, who are doing it on purpose , and should FUCKING KNOW BETTER!

They KNOW what they're doing is illegal and wrong, but they're DOING IT ANYWAY, BECAUSE THEY THINK THEY'RE ABOVE THE LAW. They really need to be made an example, in order to stop the fucking huge corporations from running amok!

In fact, not only should the executives go to jail, the entire company should be barred from doing business in the United States for some period of time (i.e., the equivalent of jail for a corporation). That's the kind of message we need to send!